looking glass
by Nygmatech
Summary: Every fairytale needs a good old fashioned villain. Tamaki/Kyouya


looking glass

_Once upon a time, there was a king, a queen, and three princes._

_But one day, the princess, who was older than the three princes, fell in the river and drowned. And the old queen was stricken down with grief, because now there was no one to pass the throne onto—the title was the Queen of Hearts, so it would be silly for a boy to become Queen._

_But the third prince, who was very ambitious and smart, had always wanted the throne, though he never had a chance because he was a boy, and the princess was older than him anyways._

_So the night after his sister's death, the prince dressed all up in the dead princess's clothing and replaced his mother on the throne, the kingdom now believing that it was the youngest prince who had fallen in the river, not the princess._

* * *

><p>It starts the day they dress up as Alice in Wonderland characters for one of the Host Club theme days. He's expecting something showy and incidental—the march hare, a playing card, the caterpillar, perhaps.<p>

But then, Hikaru and Kaoru have never been the most predictable out of the group, so he really should have seen it coming when they hold out to him a truly beautiful dress, all black and purple and heart accents.

And he accepts it without question because—because because he's the token evil teammate, and there has to be a bad guy somewhere. That's just how the universe works.

* * *

><p><em>The prince made a good queen, and managed finance in the kingdom very well, but the people misunderstood and thought he was greedy, and cutting the budget so he could steal all the money away for himself.<em>

_So his subjects started to rebel, and there were rumours passed around—behind his back, they were now calling him the Black Queen._

* * *

><p>He steps into the dress, pulls the puffy shoulders of it up over his own, and contorts his arm back almost far enough to reach the zipper, when someone gently grasps his hand and moves it back, zipping up the back of the dress at the same time.<p>

Tamaki snakes his arms around Kyouya's waist, hooks his chin over the slightly shorter man's shoulder. Kyouya can see him smiling in the mirror.

"I think you're a really pretty Queen of Hearts, Kyouya. And I'll bet not as evil, either, no matter what the twins say!"

* * *

><p><em>But there was one person who didn't think the Queen was as evil as the rest of his subjects did.<em>

_He was the prince of a neighboring kingdom, but the old King's mother didn't like him, so he wasn't going to inherit the throne. So he moved to the Queen's land, and made hats for a living, so everyone always called him the Hatter._

_But the Hatter always saw the good in people, never the bad, so he realized that the Queen must be good too, and soon befriended him._

* * *

><p>"Thank you, Tamaki," he says gently, even though he knows that isn't in the slightest true—he'll make the most manipulative, cruel Queen of Hearts yet.<p>

But Tamaki seems happy enough with that answer, and saunters off to help set up the decorations for hosting.

When Kyouya finally steps into the room, a deep purple cape of crushed velvet trailing after him, no one notices—except for Tamaki. The girls only notice when Tamaki turns his head, smiles, and gets up form his seat, moving over to kiss Kyouya's hand in a gentlemanly manner.

The girls squeal.

"Pleasure, m'lady," he says sweetly, and Kyouya has to repress the urge to hit him.

* * *

><p><em>And as time passed by, the Queen began to develop feelings for the Hatter, but it was already becoming too late, because the Hatter, who had a heart big enough for the whole world, had also befriended the Cheshire Cats, a pair of twins who were spreading rumours about the Queen, and were also poisoning the Hatter's mind with their hatred of the Queen.<em>

_Slowly, the Hatter began to believe them, but he did know the Queen, so it couldn't be all true._

_So the Queen still had enough time, right?_

_And that was when Alice came along._

* * *

><p>Kyouya didn't get any guests that afternoon, so he had to resort to sitting at his empty table doing occasional work on his laptop, but mostly watching the other hosts go about their jobs—the twins were playing up the "brotherly love" act again, as expected, and there was a whole group of girls cooing over how adorable Hani and Mori apparently looked in their animal-themed costumes.<p>

Tamaki thoroughly charms his table-and-a-half of guests, as always, and Kyouya _isn't_ jealous, especially when he notices Haruhi looking over at Tamaki every third sentence she says to her guests. He isn't jealous.

Not. One. Bit.

* * *

><p><em>Alice is a quiet, unassuming girl who's perhaps a bit too blunt and almost as kind as the Hatter. It makes sense, then, when he falls in love with her instead.<em>

_The Queen is running out of time._

_And as a last resort, he does everything he can to try and get noticed by the Hatter—everything except just be himself and maybe tell him that he loves him._

_Because in his attempts to woo the Hatter, the Queen ended up pushing his people even farther away from him, and in the end, he'll never forget the moment the Hatter simply walks up to him and says—_

* * *

><p>"—why do you always play the villain, Kyouya?" Tamaki asks naively after it's all over, as he carefully unfastens Kyouya's velvet cape, and it falls to pool at his feet. His hands move to the zipper of the dress. "I mean, you make a really really pretty Queen of Hearts so… hey! Maybe we should re-write it, so the Queen isn't such a bad person after all, just like misunderstood… like a fallen hero!" Tamaki finishes triumphantly, and the dress falls from Kyouya's shoulders.<p>

"Don't be stupid," he mutters darkly. "Heroes don't exist, Tamaki, and if they did I wouldn't be one."

"No," Tamaki says, and Kyouya turns around. His face is comically serious, bright violet eyes capturing Kyouya, holding him there, an ant under a magnifying glass. "But that doesn't mean you have to be the bad guy."

"Oh," Kyouya says, and Tamaki bridges the distance between their lips.

He gets it now.

* * *

><p><em>But no matter the Queen's efforts, the Hatter is the one thing that his immense wealth and power can not buy.<em>

_Alice and the Hatter get married in the spring, and she carries a boquet of white roses._

_The Queen orders all white roses in the palace gardens to be painted black._

_And eventually, because there is no need for a queen anymore, he will topple from his throne and drift into the recesses of the kingdom's memory, and everyone will forget, except for the Hatter, who will keep a vase of wilted black-painted roses at his bedside, and wonder sometimes if he should have chosen differently. But he's happy here, so he tries not to think too often._

_(And life goes on.)_


End file.
